How can you prioritize Employee Engagement drivers?

What I have found useful and human-centered is to enter any discussion or interaction with a sense of gratitude for the gift of the day and for the gift of the opportunity to engage with others to get meaningful work done. I picture this as if walking through a doorway into a room that exudes kindness.

Some key drivers of employee engagement are: -Effective leadership (management are transparent, ethical, provide clear guidance, recognise employee contributions) -An inclusive and diverse culture that fosters a sense of belonging -Meaningful work where staff cultivate a sense of purpose & fulfilment -Opportunities for growth & development -Work-life balance -Recognition & rewards -Fairness & transparency (esp around decision making, promotions) Identify the drivers of engagement in your company through a comprehensive approach of conducting surveys & feedback sessions, exit as well as stay interviews, assessing the workplace culture & benchmarking against best practice. Then listen to feedback, analyse the data gathered, monitor & adapt.

There's 6 main ones: 1. Clarify of expectations / goals / vision 2. Frequent two-way communication of key matters 3. Effective meetings that make good decisions 4. Psychological safety among colleagues in their interactions 5. Work doesn't cost wellbeing, but rather enriches an individual's life 6. Chance to contribute to the mission of the organisation

Some of key drivers of employee engagement are: Opportunities for learning, growth, development and career advancement. Feeling a sense of purpose and meaning, and connection to the organization's mission and values. Recognition, acknowledging and appreciating employees for their contributions and efforts. Open lines of communication and regular feedback. Allowing employees some level of autonomy in their roles and empowering them to make decisions. Work-life harmony. Relationships & team dynamics - positive relationships with colleagues and a supportive team environment. Fair compensation, competitive benefits. Job design, clarity of roles. Effective leadership & supportive management and as a positive organizational culture.

Employee engagement is an outcome of your experience at work (as well as individual characteristics). By measuring employee experience through surveys and other means you can then identify key drivers via analysis such as regression. Dominance analysis can also be useful to determine the relative importance of drivers, so you can prioritise focus areas and actions. Another simpler approach is to combine key driver analysis and a comparison to benchmarks. For example, which factors are important for engagement in your organisation and also low when compared to industry and high-performance norms?

There are myriad ways to assess gaps/trends. Strengths & Opportunities, Progress since last time vs benchmarks (internal and external), KDA against various KPIs. Whats important is pick the KPIs that matter to your org and culture, measure drivers and use those to guide action. We use a KPI that asks employees directly about experience vs expectations. We can then look at that outcome and which other KPIs and drivers of those KPIs most impact this gap between expectations and experiences. This is critical in understanding onboarding experiences for instance, where a new hire comes in and is either excited and energized or demoralized and headed toward low/dis - engagement.

Gaps are fine… But also ensure you identify the STRENGTHS as well A deficit model always looks at what is lacking, but an abundance model considers where you already have success, can can build on it Make sure you build on what is STRONG, rather than only focusing on what is WRONG

I would also take the time to understand how you're defining these "desired levels" of employee engagement. Was this determined by actually seeking feedback from employees? Is it based on purely quantitative data (missed work, HR complaints, time off requests, productivity levels) or qualitative data as well (organizational culture, transparency in communication, general tension, etc). The only way to address a "gap" is to be 100% confident that the desired level you wish to reach is an actual reflection of what employees would consider desirable.

It's critical to prioritize which engagement drivers you will develop strategies and initiatives to improve based on the unique needs of your org revealed by the data. Trying to address all drivers at once can prove to be difficult and further erode trust in leadership as it can quickly snowball into a task too complex to resolve. Analyze the data to see where the hotspots are and compare that to your organizational and business objectives to laser in on what is most important to sustaining retention, engagement, revenue, and productivity.

Here is the usual order of prioritisation for employee engagement: 1. Meetings. If you get meetings right, they are the foundation where you can build everything else from 2. Clarity of expectations. Once meetings run effectively, you’ll notice where things aren’t clear, and you can then make them clear 3. Prioritisation of workload. You’ll then realise what IS important, what you have to say NO to

The issue with plans of action is that they change So it’s better to crystal your INTENTION Thing of your plan as a framework. The details may change, but the INTENTIONS will remain fairly constant Therefore, really make these intentions clear

Having both strong commitment and an aligned plan is key to affecting change on employee engagement. Here are a few really important principles to keep in mind: 1. Take the right action, at the right level (a small number of business-wise, 'big picture' actions is enough and then, separately, allow managers time and support to act where needed on local challenges) 2. Strike a balance between information and action! (don't overwhelm managers with data - this can be a danger of too frequent surveying. What's needed is actionable data, but also support to pinpoint those drivers that need to be a priority focus) 3. Always keep an eye on common engagement drivers (career development, employee voice)

Project tools are great But you also want an overall plan that can be summarised on a page. Don’t forget the value of a one-pager for ensuring you’re super clear about what are the most important things Else, you might get lost in the weeds!

In my experience we have evaluated the outcomes through a quantitative as well as qualitative metric to identify if we have moved the needle on any of the engagement drivers. This helped us showcase the value as well as being transparent with our employees on the progress we made which in turn instills confidence that the employees voice is being heard and the company is genuinely making an effort to address the concerns.

Here are some other things to consider: - Segment employees based on demographics, job roles, or other relevant factors. Prioritize engagement drivers based on the unique needs and preferences of different employee groups. - Involve employees in the prioritization process by seeking their input and feedback. Engage them in discussions about the drivers that are most important to them and solicit ideas for improvement. - Consider the resources and budget available for implementing initiatives related to employee engagement drivers. Prioritize drivers that can be addressed effectively within existing constraints.